Sat, 3 Dec 1994 13:06:24 -0800 for <socgrad@ucsd.edu>
Date: Sat, 3 Dec 1994 14:59:42 -0600 (CST)
From: Michael Gibbons <mgibbons@cwis.unomaha.edu>
Subject: cyberspace.
To: socgrad <socgrad@UCSD.EDU>
hello all.

i can't help but feel that the locality aspect is important in dealing
with some notion of community.  we can have lots of intimate connections
across space, but i have to question what kind of community that would be.

further, i also get annoyed hearing people tout the wonderful aspect of
the internet which allows us to dissassociate with one another.  for
instance, i don't know which of you are latina, and therefore cannot be
racist in a directly individual manner.  my problem with this is that
removing the human parts of interaction allow us to avoid the problems
related to those human parts (ie racism, sexism, intimidation...), but
those problems are left undealt with until we run into other sorts o'
folks at the gas station and grocery store in our immediate and physical
community. 

while it is lots of fun to converse with you all on this network, my
understandings of you are all going to be sorely misled because of the
lack of a holistic human contact.  this is why i think that locality is
important, and that the ability of the net to be "-ism-less" if i may coin
a wierd term, is overstated.

michael